Recently I had someone challenge my view on “Once saved always saved”. They sent me a bunch of scriptures along with emotional accusations of how I’m twisting the Word of God and deceiving people. So I decided to write back to them and briefly answer all of their scriptures that sound like you can lose your salvation, and then asked them to answer all of my scriptures that guarantee our salvation. I’m still waiting to hear back from them.
In the meantime, here are all the scriptures they sent me with my answers, along with a study of some of the great guarantee scriptures.
SPOILER ALERT: the bottom line is, God is the guarantee of our salvation, not us!
Please feel free to join the conversation below in the comments section.
Galatians 5:1 – 4 “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. Look: I, Paul, say to you that if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you. I testify again to every man who accepts circumcision that he is obligated to keep the whole law. You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace.”
To fall from grace is to go back to works to try and earn, keep or complete your salvation which is stupid because salvation is through Christ alone. This is what the Galatians we’re doing. It didn’t mean they had lost their salvation it just means they were idiot! haha.
Romans 11:18-22 “…do not be arrogant toward the branches. If you are, remember it is not you who support the root, but the root that supports you. Then you will say, “Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in.” That is true. They were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast through faith. So do not become proud, but fear. For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you. Note then the kindness and the severity of God: severity toward those who have fallen, but God’s kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness. Otherwise you too will be cut off.”
To be cut off refers to the Gentiles who have been included in Christ as a whole but have yet to believe in Christ as individuals through personal faith in Jesus. Even though they/Gentiles have been grafted into Christ (included in God’s salvation plan) as a whole because of the Cross, if each individual Gentile does not have personal faith in Christ then that individual won’t continue in the grafting but will be cut off. They are told not to boast in the branches (the Gentiles grafted into God’s salvation plan) but to boast in the root – God’s salvation plan through grace by faith not performance (law) or pedigree (natural branches, Israel). The natural branches Israel were cut off because they went under the law and couldn’t earn their salvation through it, therefore the Gentiles need to boast in the root (Christ) to be saved and not continue to boast in themselves (the branches) or be cut off.
Revelation 22:19 “…and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.”
Removed from the tree of life – the purpose of this statement is not to build a doctrine of losing salvation but to put an emphasis on how important the words of this prophecy are. It’s like Paul saying that anyone who changes the Gospel may they be doubly eternally condemned. People don’t go to hell because they change the Gospel, they go to hell because they don’t have faith in Jesus and get born again. Paul wasn’t building a doctrine about losing salvation through changing the gospel, he was emphasising as strongly as he could, how important it is not to change the Gospel.
Not repenting of certain sins (Eph. 5: 3-5; 1Cor. 6:9; Gal. 5:19, Rev. 21:6-8). In these verses unbelievers are referred to either “sons of disobedience” or “those in the flesh”. Believers however are no longer “sons of disobedience” or “in the flesh”. We have come out from them and are now children of God and “in the Spirit”. As children of God we shouldn’t continue to act the same as the sons of disobedience do who are facing the wrath of God for their behaviour and unbelief. But don’t confuse the two, It doesn’t say believers will face the wrath of God, it just says we shouldn’t act the same as unbelievers who are facing the wrath of God for what they do, since we have come out from them.
1 Corinthians 9:27 “But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.”
To be disqualified is not to lose salvation but to not finish your race or your destiny in this life. You were not able to run in the purposes of God and win (fulfil your destiny) because you were overcome your flesh.
1 Corinthians 15:1-2 “Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain.”
Colossians 1:22-23 “…he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister.”
These are reference to weed out false converts in the church who hadn’t truly believed the gospel and were seeking to lead others astray into the philosophies of this world or to mixing Jesus with Judaism or idol worship. These false believers don’t have a commitment to Christ but will abandon Him at the first sign of trouble or persecution. But true believers stand firm.
Hebrews 3:6; 14 “…but Christ is faithful over God’s house as a son. And we are his house, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope.”
Verse 14: “For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end.”
This is not speaking to the church but to Jews who were mixing Moses with Christ and had “yet to enter God’s rest”. It’s all in the same context of the unbelieving generation of Israel who failed to enter the promised land because they did not combine the message with faith if you read chapter 4. The context of these verses is not being kicked out of the promised land (losing salvation) but failing to enter it (not saved yet). The current day Israel were not mixing the gospel of Christ/Messiah with faith and that is why a few verses later is says some of them have yet to enter God’s rest. They came all the way up to the Jordan in Moses but didn’t continue in Christ into salvation.
Revelation 3:1-5 “And to the angel of the church in Sardis write: ‘The words of him who has the seven spirits of God and the seven stars. “‘I know your works. You have the reputation of being alive, but you are dead. Wake up, and strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have not found your works complete in the sight of my God. Remember, then, what you received and heard. Keep it, and repent. If you will not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come against you. Yet you have still a few names in Sardis, people who have not soiled their garments, and they will walk with me in white, for they are worthy. The one who conquers will be clothed thus in white garments, and I will never blot his name out of the book of life. I will confess his name before my Father and before his angels.”
The church in Sardis started out well but ended up full of false converts “you have a reputation of being alive but you are dead”. There were still a few in the church who were true believers, the rest needed to wake up, which is to repent and actually believe the gospel, which is what the church used to walk in. This wasn’t a threat of losing salvation, it was a warning that they are in danger because they are not truly saved even though they think they are.
2 Peter 2:20-22 “For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them. What the true proverb says has happened to them: “The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire.”
This refers to false converts who had escaped the defilements of this world for a little while but were easily led astray and back to them. They were not true born again believers. How do we know this? Because they are referred to as dogs returning to vomit, pigs returning to the mud. The were dogs/pigs who never became true sheep but simply returned to being who they truly are.
Matthew 24:13 “But the one who endures to the end will be saved.”
The Church has built a whole doctrine on this scripture and ones similar threatening the loss of salvation for those who don’t endure to the end. The focus then becomes our ability and strength to endure through persecutions and trouble but that’s religion and not the true Gospel. Grace puts the focus on Jesus and what His power can do in us. So I don’t fear persecution or falling away but I fix my eyes on Jesus in whom I have overcome. This scripture sums up the whole issue of enduring or overcoming perfectly: 1 John 5:4-5 “For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. Who is he who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?”
Those who are born of God overcome this world/endure to the end.
Our faith has caused us to overcome this world/endure to the end.
Christ is the one who causes us to be saved in the end if we are born again through faith in Him.
The guarantee scriptures.
Hebrews 7:23-25 (ESV) “The former priests were many in number, because they were prevented by death from continuing in office, but he holds his priesthood permanently, because he continues forever. Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them.”
Once someone has come to Christ and is born again, Jesus is then always making intercession for them. That means their salvation is not dependent upon them but upon Christ’s ability to intercede for them. And guess what “Christ is able to save to the uttermost!”
Hebrews 10:11-15 (NKJV) “And every priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God, from that time waiting till His enemies are made His footstool. For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.”
Those who are being sanctified (set apart in Christ) are made perfect forever! For how long? Forever! How long is forever? Until their next sin? Until they may get deceived and reject Christ? No, forever is forever and it happens the moment they are born again and separated unto Christ (sanctified).
1 Peter 1: 23 (NKJV) “…having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the word of God which lives and abides forever…”
We have been born again of incorruptible seed. That means our salvation is incorruptible and just as the Word of God lives and abides forever so does our new born again life.
2 Corinthians 1:21-22 (NIV) “Now it is God who makes both us and you stand firm in Christ. He anointed us, set his seal of ownership on us, and put his Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.”
God makes us stand firm in Christ not us.
God set His seal of ownership on us – even if we reject Him He still owns us!
God put His Spirit in our hearts as a deposit that guarantees what is to come – we don’t guarantee what is to come by our works, that would make salvation weak. God took it out of our hands and put it in His. We simply believed in Christ – God does all the rest!
Romans 8:38-39 (ESV) “For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
John 10:27-29 (NKJV) “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand.”
2 Thessalonians 2:16-17 (ESV) “Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God our Father, who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace, comfort your hearts and establish them in every good work and word.”
Ephesians 1:13-14 (NKJV) “In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory.”
1 John 5:11-13 (NKJV) “And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God.”
Titus 3:4-7 (NKJV) “But when the kindness and the love of God our Savior toward man appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, that having been justified by His grace we should become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.”
2 Corinthians 5:4-5 (NKJV) “For we who are in this tent groan, being burdened, not because we want to be unclothed, but further clothed, that mortality may be swallowed up by life. Now He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who also has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.”
Bottom line, God guarantees our salvation, not us!
Have your say in the comments below.
God bless you, and may His peace fill you in every way.
– Ryan Rufus.
HERE’S A LINK TO AN ARTICLE THAT A GUY BY THE NAME OF MATT LACLEAR WROTE, ALSO ABOUT “ONCE SAVED ALWAYS SAVED”:
https://agapewoodwork.com/blogs/bible-lessons/once-saved-always-saved
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